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10.31.2010 0

Hollywood Leftists, Green Groups Outspend Supporters of California Proposition to Suspend Regulations

  • On: 11/01/2010 10:07:41
  • In: Energy Crisis, Global Warming Fraud, and the Environment
  • By Kevin Mooney

    Despite being heavily outspent, the proponents of Proposition 23 in California are within range of an election victory that could help unravel energy rationing schemes that originated in their state. Outgoing Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed off the Global Warming Solutions Act (AB 32) in September, 2006.

    The law, which is scheduled to go into effect in 2012, would set emissions restrictions and renewable mandates that would raise energy prices and increase jobless rates, new studies show.

    Proposition 23 calls for the law to be suspended until after unemployment drops to 5.5 percent or below for four consecutive quarters. This stipulation would effectively kill the legislation. Although media reports tend to focus on the support Proposition 23 has received from business interests, the opposing side actually has a huge financial advantage that has gone unreported.

    Maplight.org, a non-partisan group that tracks campaign funding has produced some telling statistics that deserve greater publicity and attention. Liberal activist Thomas Steyer has spent $5 million to defeat Prop 23, while the National Wildlife Foundation has spent $3 million, and the Sierra Club has spent another $1.2 million. Just those three sources, have spent more money than all of the Prop 23 supporters combined.

    “Green activists and allied rent seekers like to portray themselves as the underdogs against big business in their environmental causes,” Ben Lieberman, a senior fellow for environmental policy has observed. “The battle over Proposition 23 — the California ballot measure to suspend the state’s global warming law until unemployment is under control — is certainly no exception. But they have David and Goliath backwards here; those spending to defeat the measure and keep California cap and tax in place have outgunned supporters of reform by at least 3 to 1.”

    Only a small percentage of the amount spent against Prop 23 comes from average in-state residents, Lieberman points out.

    “In fact, most of the money has come in the form of six and seven figure contributions from big environmental groups, Hollywood bigshots, and, most disturbingly, opportunists like venture capitalists John Doerr and Vinod Khosla, who hope to secure a guaranteed market selling alternative energy and vehicles far too expensive to compete otherwise,” he has written.

    Most recently, Gov. Schwarzenegger teamed up with his former Hollywood Director James Cameron to defeat the proposition. Cameron has pumped $1 million into the “No on 23? efforts.

    Recent polls show voter sentiments are evenly split. If the proposition does pass, it could doom “cap and trade” laws that were passed in other states in response to AB-32.

    Kevin Mooney is a contributing editor to Americans for Limited Government (ALG) News Bureau.


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